


breakfast

by enamuko



Series: FE Rarepair Week 2k19 [2]
Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Domestic Fluff, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-30
Updated: 2019-09-30
Packaged: 2020-11-08 13:36:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20836355
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/enamuko/pseuds/enamuko
Summary: Iago didn't deserve any of this. Didn't deserve to wake up next to the love of his life, didn't deserve to have Corrin in his life to begin with, not after how many years he'd spent grovelling at her father's feet and dismissing her as nothing but a nuisance to Nohr Industries. But here he is.





	breakfast

**Author's Note:**

> I really couldn't go through rarepair week without writing something for these two. Takes place in a modern AU that has been in my brain for years but I never do anything with. Nothing really complicated, just replace countries/kingdoms with companies lmao.  
Written for Fire Emblem Rarepair Week! Prompt is "Coffee".

Iago groaned, rolling over to shield his eyes from the bright morning sun coming in through the curtains. Rather than the expected pillow or mattress, he found his nose buried in a mess of soft hair that tickled until, in his half-asleep state, he had to sit up and sneeze.

It took him a moment to orient himself— and a moment more to actually open his eyes in the face of the god-forsaken sunlight— and he froze up, brain addled by sleep, when someone snuffled sleepily next to him.

He looked down and was greeted with an absolute nest of platinum blonde hair that was doing a good job at hiding the sleeping woman underneath. Corrin. His heart stopped skipping beats as he managed to wake up fully and realize that no, a deviant hadn’t broken into his apartment and climbed into bed with him.

It was just Corrin.

Grumbling as he rubbed the sleep out of his eye with the heel of his hand, Iago grabbed his phone off the nightstand to consult it about the time. 10am.  _ Far _ later than he was used to sleeping, even on a Saturday. No wonder his head was pounding and the sun was so irritatingly  _ bright _ .

He climbed out of bed, reached for his robe where it was hanging by the door and slipped it on— not that he had to worry about modesty when they were the only two there, but he wasn’t used to walking around quite so  _ exposed _ .

(Sleeping naked had never been a preference of his, but he certainly couldn’t deny the…  _ Convenience _ of it.)

He paused in the doorway and looked back at Corrin, asleep peacefully in his bed, and it was almost—  _ almost _ enough to get him to say ‘fuck it’ and crawl back into bed, spending the entire day there…

But there was one siren song that called to him even louder than the comfort of curling up with her.

_ Coffee _ .

Iago couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a lazy Saturday. He was pretty sure the answer was  _ never _ . He certainly couldn’t remember ever just stretching out on the couch with the news turned on low in the background, a fresh cup of coffee in hand, not even  _ dressed _ at quarter-past ten in the morning…

Then again, Iago wasn’t really used to having what most people would consider a ‘day off’. Normally he would have been up for hours already, dressed and ready for the day, either heading into the office to catch up on work or running about on some personal errand for Garon…

Those days were over, though. And he quite staunchly ignored the dull ache in his chest when he thought that.

He took a sip of his coffee and sighed as he settled back on the decorative cushions Corrin had strewn across the couch. (Though he’d be willing to bet her sister had more to do with that than she did. Embroidered pillows were not exactly Corrin’s style.) 

Just as he was wondering when his sleeping beauty was going to join him (he knew Corrin was anything but a morning person, but sleeping in past noon seemed like a  _ little _ much, even for her, no matter how strenuous their…  _ Activities _ had been the night before) when he heard his bedroom door open and shut, followed by the shuffling of feet…

When Corrin emerged into the living room, she didn’t look completely awake; her hair was an untamed mess, sticking up in all sorts of strange directions (even more than usual), and she was practically falling out of the tank top she had pulled on for the sake of modesty. She didn’t even have her eyes fully open; they were cracked just enough for her to navigate through his apartment without bumping into walls.

She didn’t even say anything as she dragged herself over to the couch and climbed directly on top of him, forcing him to do some interesting things with his hands and arms to lift the coffee above himself to avoid spilling it.

“Good morning?” He raised an eyebrow at her, and chuckled when the only response he got was a muffled groaning noise made directly into his chest. He was always a little surprised by how heavy she was; he wasn’t extremely strong, but he was still surprised that he felt like he could hardly move with her weight directly on top of him. And it seemed like she had no intentions of getting up any time soon…

Oh, well. It wasn’t like he had anywhere to be. Which was still… An odd feeling, but one he could live with, he supposed.

He maneuvered to take another sip of his coffee despite the weight on his chest, then had to perform some probably hilarious looking acrobatics to keep from spilling it all over the place or throwing the mug across the room when Corrin suddenly lifted her head.

“You’re being  _ extremely _ inconvenient,” he said, squirming and debating just shoving her off.

“Can I have some?” she asked, ignoring his comment entirely. Her voice was hoarse. It took him a moment to realize what she was talking about.

“I made a pot,” he said. “You can get up and make your own.”

“Iagooooo…”

“Your whining might work on Gunter, but it won’t work on me,” he said with a sharp sniff. “You don’t even like black coffee; you dump so much milk and sugar into it I don’t even think you can legally call it  _ coffee _ .”

“I don’t care how it tastes, I just need it to wake up!”

“You’d sleep the entire day if you could!”

Corrin lifted her head to glare at him, and it would have  _ almost _ looked intimidating if not for the fact that her hair was sticking up in one big cowlick on the back of her head— and if she wasn’t Corrin, with her completely unintimidating baby face.

Iago took another drink of his coffee, and Corrin reached out to try and snatch it from him. He dodged her first attempt, but as he was trying to switch it to his other hand without spilling it, she got the best of him and grabbed it.

The one upside was that, in order to avoid choking, she  _ did _ wiggle her way up until she was sitting up on the other side of the couch, instead of being planted firmly on top of him.

She took a sip of the coffee and made a face. He smirked, waiting for her to admit he was right, but she looked over at him and narrowed her eyes before going back in for another sip.

Stubborn girl.

With a shake of his head, he got up and went into the kitchen to make himself another cup. When he came back, to her credit, Corrin had at least managed to finish half of what was remaining, even if her face was permanently scrunched up.

“Is forcing yourself to drink that  _ really _ easier than getting up and walking fifteen feet?” he asked as he took his seat on the couch again, but stayed sitting up this time, because he knew Corrin far too well. And true to form, as soon as he sat down, Corrin scooted across the couch to mold herself to his side.

“Well,  _ excuse _ me for being tired and sore this morning,” she said, turning so her head was resting against his chest, looking up at him and sticking her tongue out at him. “I think you had a little something to do with that, so maybe you should just let me be lazy.”

“Corrin!”

Iago reached into her rat’s nest of hair to tweak her ear, in hopes that it would make her ignore the fact that he was turning bright red.

It wasn’t that he was a prude or anything— but she was so  _ straightforward _ about it, how was he  _ supposed _ to react?

“Whaaaaaat!” she whined, grabbing at his wrist, her stolen cup of coffee sloshing dangerously enough to make him let go before he had to spend his Saturday afternoon shopping for a new couch. “Come on, Iago… It’s Saturday, we were up really late, we wore ourselves out… Do you blame me for wanting to be lazy?”

“There’s a difference between having a relaxing day and being too lazy to even walk across the room,” he said, but he had to admit— sitting there with Corrin resting against him, feeling her warm body pressed up against him, he could see how people enjoyed this.

Corrin didn’t try to defend herself; she merely hummed and nuzzled in against him, clinking her mug against his. His robe had come slightly undone in the time since he had woken up, and she pressed a kiss to his exposed collarbone.

If you had told Iago a year ago that he would be spending his Saturday morning attempting to struggle his way through making breakfast with a woman who had been tended to by professional chefs and servants her entire life, he would have not only called you a liar, he probably would have tried to have you committed.

They had stayed on the couch for as long as Iago could stand it before he had to  _ get up _ and  _ do something _ . Of course, he didn’t really have anything  _ to _ do, which had led to the suggestion of breakfast, and then he’d managed to wheedle Corrin into joining him through simply playfully insulting her until her pride forced her to prove him wrong, and now…

“Ah! I got the shell in it…”

Corrin frowned down at the frying pan as she tried to pick the bits of eggshell out of the egg without burning herself on the pan. Iago was torn between whether he should offer to help before she managed to burn his kitchen down, or whether it was worth it to watch a sheltered rich girl struggle through the basics of learning to feed herself while he contented himself with a second cup of coffee and being on toast duty.

Eventually, heart (and a desire to not have to clean up her mess) won out over pettiness and he slipped in behind her, hand sliding down her arm to her wrist as he lightly pried her hands away from the frying pan.

“Maybe I should take it from here?” he suggested, leaning in to murmur it directly into her ear.

It was cute when she tried to argue with him that she could take care of herself. It was even cuter when she  _ didn’t _ try, because she was too flustered by the most basic displays of affection.

Which really should have been something he analyzed a little deeper, but… Well, he wasn’t going to question the best thing that had ever happened to him.

Corrin let him take the frying pan from her without any further prompting, and he took over with the eggs, adding the bacon alongside. He wasn’t exactly an accomplished chef either, but he at least hadn’t been waited on hand and foot his entire life…

Yes, it was no exaggeration to say that a year ago he never would have been able to imagine this. For one, Garon had still been alive a year ago. No matter that he and Corrin had never seen eye to eye, or that he’d never had much time or love to spare for his adopted daughter; he never would have stood for…  _ This _ .

For Iago being dedicated to anyone but him, honestly, especially not one of his children, who Garon had always seen as more of a threat to him than anything else. And Iago had never imagined he would  _ want _ anything other than to be completely and utterly dedicated to Garon…

Then Corrin had swept into his life, hopelessly naive, determined to prove herself to a father she still hadn’t realized didn’t really care about her, and determined to see the good in him against all odds even when Garon had specifically instructed him to make sure that she failed no matter what she tried to do to ensure that she quit before she managed to jeopardize any part of his company with her ideals…

And then, against all odds, she’d managed to charm him. When Garon finally became fed up with her and more or less kicked her out onto the streets in one of his fits, he’d offered her a place to stay, still at the time thinking of Garon and how no matter how he felt at the moment it would still reflect poorly on him to have one of his children just thrown out like that… She had accepted, had wormed her way into his heart somehow with her antics and the way she was just so bloody  _ cheerful _ and yet didn’t seem to mind at all that he was her complete opposite, and had gone so much out of her way to comfort  _ him _ when  _ her _ father died…

And now, here they were. Cooking breakfast (albeit poorly) in his apartment, as though it were the most natural thing in the world, rather than a complete anomaly.

Soon they ended up with something relatively edible, although the bacon was a bit charred and the eggs a bit rubbery. Since Iago had never really seen the appeal in food for its own sake, instead seeing it as simply a fuel source, and he was pretty sure Corrin had never cooked for herself in her life, he was decently proud of their results.

“Have you really never just… Spent a lazy Saturday not doing anything?” Corrin asked, jabbing her fork in his direction before popping a chunk of rubbery egg into her mouth. (The texture might not have been the most agreeable, but the taste was fine. Eggs were eggs, after all.)

“Unlike  _ some _ people, I’ve always had an important job to do. I couldn’t spend an entire day sitting around watching cartoons or whatever it is you do on your weekends.”

“Excuse me! I did things on weekends!” Corrin huffed. “Just not, you know,  _ work _ . I spent time with my family, practiced piano, you know… Fun stuff.”

Iago scoffed. “It’s not like I’ve never had a weekend to myself. I’ve just had better things to do than concern myself with things like that.”

“You’d work yourself right into the grave if you were allowed,” Corrin said, sounding exasperated and fond at the same time.

Someone sighing fondly about him… What a world. Even his closest friends didn’t behave so casually around him. Hans took a genuine enjoyment in annoying him, while Zola always seemed to dance nervously around him, even while he was throwing himself full-throttle into doing whatever he asked of him…

It was… Nice. In a way he definitely didn’t deserve, but was going to enjoy anyway, because fuck it. The more people told him he didn’t deserve something (and Corrin’s siblings said as much,  _ often _ ), the more he just wanted to rub it in their faces.

Maybe they could go visit with her siblings. Not that he  _ wanted _ to spend any more time with them than he normally already did while they were at work, but it was always nice to see them forcing themselves to be polite and not scowl at him because they didn’t want to hurt Corrin’s’ feelings. It almost made up for the twenty some odd years of Hell they’d all put him through…

...And besides, it would make Corrin happy. Which (and he never thought he’d say this) was the important thing.

He would bring up that idea later, though. Right now? Right now he was too focused on being in the moment. The kitchen smelled like fresh-brewed coffee and half-burned bacon and eggs. Corrin was talking through a mouthful of eggs, about how he needed to take better care of himself and how she was going to make sure he knew how to do things other than work all the time, as if he was some kind of child who needed to be taken care of (and wasn’t that even more amusing, considering how much older he was than her…).

No, he really didn’t deserve any of this, he decided. Maybe the Nohr siblings could be right once in a blue moon. He took another sip of coffee, idly, unable to drag his eyes away from Corrin even though she still looked like a half-awake mess and had a smear of egg yolk on the corner of her mouth and was still yammering on about how he was going to work himself into an early grave (as if he hadn’t been doing so much less work since Xander took over the company, now that he could focus on his actual job and not on also being someone’s personal assistant— Xander had his own errand boy, and Iago would have quit long before he debased himself to doing the  _ same _ job for Xander that he had gone or Garon for so many years).

“Corrin,” he said finally, reaching out to put his hand over hers. She stopped, instantly, perking up at the simple touch with a glimmer in her eye. “Take a breath before you choke on your food.”

That prompted her to turn red and quickly swallow so she could stick her tongue out at him. Iago chuckled as he sat back in his chair, half-finished breakfast ignored (he wasn’t a big eater, for the most part) in favour of just drinking his coffee, even though he was better rested than he’d been in years...

He could almost excuse the horrible, milky excuse for coffee that  _ Corrin _ was drinking.

Almost.


End file.
